State by State Data

Our Work

Current Projects

The Project on Student Debt works to increase public understanding of rising student debt and the implications for our families, economy, and society. Through research, policy development, and advocacy, the Project’s goal is to identify cost-effective solutions that expand educational opportunity, protect family financial security, and advance economic competitiveness

California’s Master Plan for higher education, adopted in 1960, guarantees a place in college for every state resident who can benefit. In the face of today’s challenges, the state needs to find new ways to keep that promise. TICAS engages in this work with a focus on the role of financial aid in serving the 2.1 million students at California’s community colleges.

College InSight is a unique new web site for higher education data and research. The site is a valuable resource for anyone interested in college affordability, student debt, economic and racial diversity, student success, and other important issues in higher education.

The Difficult Dialogues Initiative was a program designed to promote academic freedom and religious, cultural, and political pluralism on college and university campuses in the United States. Supported by the Ford Foundation, 43 institutions are implementing projects that address a wide range of topics. Through the Assessment and Evaluation Development Team (AEDT), TICAS has worked with the Difficult Dialogues Initiative providing technical assistance and support in the areas of assessment and evaluation to grantee institutions.

Working for the Pathways to College Network, TICAS developed a web site to assist agencies and organizations that want to use marketing techniques to help increase college participation. The site allows college access professionals the ability to share effective strategies and materials, avoid common mistakes, and find creative ideas.

Early on, TICAS studied ways to make the federal student loan programs more cost-efficient, freeing up funds to help more families afford college. That work, previously known as Student Loan Watch, is now part of Higher Ed Watch, a project of the New America Foundation’s Education Policy Program.

Featured Work

On the Sidelines of Simplication exposes how an often-overlooked part of the federal student aid process delays aid and enrollment for low-income students, consuming the time of college access and financial aid professionals and frustrating their efforts to help students afford and succeed in college.

Seven in 10 seniors (68%) who graduated from public and nonprofit colleges in 2015 had student loan debt, with an average of $30,100 per borrower. This represents a 4% increase from the average debt of 2014 graduates.

States of Denial finds that nearly one in 10 community college students nationwide – almost 1 million across 32 states – does not have access to federal student loans because their school chooses not to offer them.

On the Verge documents California community college students’ struggles to cover college expenses beyond tuition, their experiences with financial aid, and the troubling tradeoffs they face when available resources do not stretch far enough.

In 2013-14, nearly one million community college students across the nation were denied access to federal student loans. Our report includes national and state-by-state analyses of loan access by race/ethnicity and urbanicity, and takes an in-depth look at North Carolina, California, and Georgia.